Biden slams planned Brexit deal breach with EU

LONDON — The British government faced more opposition Thursday to its plans to breach the Brexit agreement with the European Union, with Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden becoming the latest American politician to express alarm and the EU rejecting the U.K.’S stated rationale.

An EU spokesman insisted the 27-nation bloc was negotiating in good faith with the U.K. and had “literally hundreds” of international deals with which to prove its reliability as a partner after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson insinuated the opposite.

Johnson has argued that his government is pursuing a law that would override parts of the Brexit deal as an insurance policy against “unreasonable” behavior by the EU that could threaten the U.K. unity by disrupting trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the country.

The prime minister’s move to break parts of the EU divorce deal relating to Northern Ireland has triggered fears it could undermine the 1998 Good Friday peace accord that ended decades of violence between Irish nationalists and British unionists.

“We can’t allow the Good Friday Agreement that brought peace to

Northern Ireland to become a casualty of Brexit,” Biden tweeted.

“Any trade deal between the U.S. and U.K. must be contingent upon respect for the Agreement and preventing the return of a hard border. Period,” he wrote.

Britain and the EU jointly promised in the Brexit divorce agreement to ensure there are no customs posts or other obstacles on the Northern Ireland-ireland border. The open border is key to the stability that underpins the peace settlement.

The U.K. withdrew from the EU’S political institutions on Jan. 31 but remains in a tariff-free transition period until the end of the year.